Many regions of the world have suffered recurrent natural calamities, inflicting heavy human and economic losses. Despite the scientific and technical advances made by mankind, the rate of such catastrophes is on the rise, whether natural or man-made. Human progress elements could not stop the occurrence of calamities, mainly caused by climate change and human factors.
Calamities include unheralded, natural catastrophes such as cyclones, earthquakes, seasonal floods and volcanoes or artificial ones such as fires and explosions. Add to this, prolonged calamities such as drought and deforestation. Whatever the causes of catastrophes, they adversely affect millions of people, economically, socially or psychologically. The latter is the most crucial, and should be prevented or minimized as much as possible.
Efforts made to alleviate the impact of such calamities used to focus only on handling the incident, devoting all potentials to address post-calamity effects. However, the recurrence, increased intensity and the massive reach of their effects caused scientists, specialists and decision makers to acknowledge the need for permanent international efforts to alleviate the human, economic, social, psychological and environmental losses resulting from such catastrophes. This is in addition to concerted efforts by civil society organizations in individual countries to ameliorate the effects of calamities.
In this context, comes the Armed Forces important role in handing many worldwide catastrophes. They possess potentials not available to other state organs, such as the civil defense, the ministries of health and interior as well as other public and private agencies to control such tragic incidents.
Recent incidents in Al-Eiss in Al-Madinah Al-Munawarah region of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia have focused the attention on the need for close cooperation among all the state’s civil organs and institutions and the Armed Forces to control the effect of such calamities. Also, the stress was made on the need to utilize the Armed Forces technical abilities and potentials to enhance the potentials of governmental and civil defense organs in confronting such incidents.
This article shed lights on catastrophes, highlighting their types, effects and human role in their occurrence as well as the economic losses resulting from them. This is in addition to calamities befalling developing nations and international efforts to alleviate their impact, focusing mainly on the Armed Forces role in this respect, no less in importance than its role in the defense of the homeland: in both cases the noble goal is to save lives and properties and preserve security and stability.
First: the concept, types and impact of catastrophes:
A . catastrophe definition:
The most favored definition is that a catastrophe is any natural or man-made incident that extremely affects or disrupts life, causing material and human losses and requiring efforts by military and civil bodies to confront it.
The international civil protection organization and the Arab League define a catastrophe as any major incident inflicting heavy losses of lives and property. It may be natural such as floods, earthquakes and cyclones or man-made, voluntary or involuntary or deliberate or by omission, requiring national or international assistance.
All definitions concur on the following features of a calamity:
Difficult to predict and arrive unheralded.
Causing heavy human, material and environmental losses.
May be natural or man-made, either deliberately or by omission or mistake.
In most cases dwarfs the potentials of people and agencies of the afflicted country, requiring regional and international assistance.
B . Types of catastrophes:
Catastrophes are classified into two types according to their causes, as follows:
Natural calamities (not caused by man):
They include: earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, landslides, torrential rains, storms and cyclones.
Man-made catastrophes: they include: calamities accompanying conventional or non-conventional wars (nuclear, chemical or biological), powerful explosions, radiation, chemical and biological leakage, sabotage and floods resulting from the collapse of dams. Each catastrophe causes its own economic, social and health damage. The magnitude of damage hinges on the type of calamity and the nature of the afflicted region: village, city, population density, the intensity and duration of the catastrophe, the element of surprise and the time of its occurrence.
C . Catastrophe stages:
Scientists and experts concerned with addressing calamities classified them according to the following stages:
The early warning stage: this involves predictable calamities such as storms, cyclones, rains and tidal waves, caused by climate changes.
Catastrophe threat stage: the period during which the region or country is threatened with occurrence of a calamity, whether short or long.
Catastrophe impact stage: the duration of the catastrophe, its impact on the region or country.
The stage of wounded list and the devastating impact of the catastrophe: this is the stage when the effects begin to unravel requiring quick rescue action.
Rescue stage: at this stage urgent action is required to rescue lives and property, placing the incident under control.
Treatment and reconstruction stage: at this stage normalcy is restored, taking the necessary measures to prevent its recurrence.
These stages should be taken into consideration by all civil and military authorities when planning to confront the incident in order that each agency should know its duties, determining the proper time for its interference to alleviate the impact.
Types of catastrophe-caused losses:
Whatever the type of calamities, they normally inflict various losses, including:
Heavy material and human losses, particularly in natural unheralded calamities, taking the region by surprise and multiplying human losses (men, women and children) and material losses (services, infrastructure, economic projects and animal and agricultural resources).Economic losses incurred by the state including the undermining of infrastructure, development projects and services as well as the cost of reconstruction to restore normalcy.
Social impact: a catastrophe may cause an imbalance in the social fabric due to economic losses that take long time to redress. This is evident in the individual’s poor purchase power, high poverty rates, the emergence of a new category of displaced people and wide-scale pillage.
Political impact: the government’s inability to handle a catastrophe at the appropriate time could cause political problems in the afflicted region, including the victims desire to hold officials accountable for certain shortcomings, trying to force the resignation of governments through parliament.
Health impact: the catastrophe may cause the outbreak of epidemics and scarcity of health services, highlighting the need for providing enough health services in the afflicted region.
Second: man’s role in natural catastrophes:
A debate that continued for several decades concluded that nature is not solely responsible for natural disasters, adding that human activity, particularly the economic activity, play a significant role in increasing the intensity of these disasters. Climate change and the rise in earth temperature are to blame for such disasters as: earthquakes, volcanoes, cyclones and floods. Another reason is the spread of animal and human diseases as a result of profit-driven economic activity. These include mad cow, Dengue fever, bird flu, Swine Flu and AIDS.
There is no denying that man plays a basic role either through increased economic activity that affects earth’s temperature or interference in the feeding of animals and birds to reap quick profits. This is in addition to the absence of coordination among nations which may exacerbate the adverse effects of such disasters as locusts in African countries and the swine flu currently spreading throughout the world.
Regarding the role of climate change in increasing the incidence of natural disasters, world attention is still focusing on the response of industrial nations as they are responsible first and foremost for the emission of gasses resulting from their massive industrial activity. Although most nations have signed Kyoto protocol curtailing the emission of such gases, industrial countries refuse to adhere to this international protocol. Also, there are differences about the role of the developing nations although their peoples are the most affected by natural disasters and climate change.
Attention was also drawn to certain governments’ failure to respect the basic rules of continuous development, neglecting the safety of buildings and schools and specifying no rules for such safety. This is in addition to allowing people to stay at places that are prone to disasters, e.g. in Thailand blocks of hotels were built on the seafront to face the threat of giant waves while mangroves and coral reefs were removed from the coastal area, increasing the possibility of disaster. Moreover, the old, decaying sewage drainage networks as well as the removal of green spaces and the small rivers that store water before returning it to the sea have increased the threat of floods, killing large numbers of people around the world, including in Bombay, India.
Thus, the devastating economic development and environmental policies have made many communities prone to disasters and their adverse impact. So, if both the developed and developing nations did not control their economic behavior and respect the environmental dimensions, the natural disasters will increase in intensity, causing more human and economic losses.
Third: worldwide human and economic costs of natural disasters:
It is extremely difficult to accurately estimate the human and economic costs of natural disasters. But statistics indicate that there is a decline in the number of deaths in the last 20 years. 800000 were killed in the nineties compared to one million in the seventies. However, the statistics indicate that total number of victims have tripled during the last decade reaching two billion across the globe.
Red Cross reports indicated that 80000 people were killed annually by natural disasters during the nineties and 700 calamities hit the world in the year 2003, killing 75,000 persons and causing economic damage worth $65 billion. Red Cross estimates show that the World Bank alone spent $12.5 billion on reconstruction operations in areas suffering from natural disasters during the period 1980-2003. The Red Cross warns that the human and economic cost of disasters will increase due to certain factors such as environmental violations, climate change and population growth as well as globalization.
Modern natural calamities whose losses are difficult to estimate include: the 1980s Spanish flu and the Swine Flu that afflicted more than one million, killing increased numbers. Add to this the Tsunami disaster in South and East Asia in December 2004. 12 countries were hit, but the most afflicted were India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, the Maldives and Thailand. The World Bank estimated their losses as follows:
Sri Lanka: 31,000 were killed and 1,000 houses were destroyed. It needs $1.5 billion for reconstruction, or 7% of its gross domestic product. 443,000 were displaced and 200,000 lost their jobs.
Indonesia: economic losses were estimated at $4.5 billion. Human losses were not accurately estimated, but 7,700 children lost their parents while 1.3 million were displaced.
India: 11,000 persons were killed mostly women and children and 645,000 families were affected. Reconstruction costs were estimated at $1.2 billion as 150,000 homes were destroyed, 80% of them owned by workers in the fisheries sector.
The Maldives: losses totaled two thirds of the annual gross domestic product. The tourist sector was the most devastated, losing 30% of its revenues. This caused a general budget deficit of $95 million and the government is struggling to pay workers salaries.
These are few examples of tsunami’s direct damage estimates which will increase many folds if we take into consideration the disaster’s indirect losses such as the infrastructure damage, individual income losses and governmental revenue losses, in addition to trade and tourism losses. It could safety be said that natural disasters cause huge human and economic losses. Also, cyclone and floods disasters cause direct losses such as deaths, wounded persons, displaced people and epidemics. This is in addition to the destruction of the infrastructure, houses, facilities, crops and suspension of production and environmental damage.
A Swine Flu catastrophe increases the number of deaths and raises the cost of treatment and provision of drugs and vaccines. The consequences will be far worse if it turned into a worldwide epidemic.
All these effects will increase government spending on reconstruction and treatment; this will in turn disrupt development as allocations will be diverted to the relief operation, reconstruction, prevention and treatment. Also exports will decline while imports of food and medicine will increase and the state’s public revenues will drop. This is in addition to a decline in savings and investments and a widening income gap between the classes. So, if it is difficult to estimate the direct human and economic losses of natural disasters, then it is more difficult or even impossible to estimate the indirect losses, taking into account the short-term and long term social, psychological and humanitarian impact.
Fourth: natural calamities in developing nations:
Developing nations and poor regions are the areas most affected by natural disasters. That was distinctly evident in such disasters as tsunami, recent earthquakes in China and Iran and the 1998 cyclone in Honduras, among others. These catastrophes have massively undermined the human and material capital in these poor regions, reducing income, increasing unemployment and complicating efforts to restore normalcy. The natural disasters’ more devastating impact on poor nations compared to more developed nations could be traced back to the following reasons:
The developing nations in general are located in disaster-prone regions. Studies have shown that most less developed nations are subjected to huge disasters once every two years on the average compared to one major disaster every four years in the case of developing nations.
The poor population in developing and less developed nations is concentrated in dangerous areas shunned by the rich, such as slopes, valleys, river banks and mountains.
Non availability of early warning systems in poor countries and regions compared to advanced nations.
Natural disasters have easily destroyed the livelihood and economic infrastructure in poor regions, particularly the houses which, in most cases, are not built according to specifications. That was evident in the recent earthquake in Iran which destroyed entire villages.
There is no insurance on lives and property in poor regions compared to developed countries. Add to this poor insurance awareness in developing countries while the insurance sector is unable to cover big risks resulting from natural disasters.
Budgets allocations are insufficient to confront such catastrophes in poor nations compared to developed countries. This deepens the disaster impact when governments are forced to divert investment and development allocations to pay for relief and rescue operations.
The poor population’s meger savings, inability to obtain credits and their reliance on the public services makes them less able to confront disasters than the rich population. Such a situation is made worse by their poor skills and education, increasing the likelyhood of losing their jobs and landing new ones in the wake of the disaster.
Corruption is rife in poor countries, increasing the possibility of constructing public buildings and facilities not conforming to specifications and unable to sustain natural disasters such as earthquake, cyclones and floods.
Meanwhile, a report by ECA and a host of non-governmental organizations issued in September 2009, indicated that current climate change will make the developing nations more prone to threats and natural disasters, losing between 1% to 12% of their gross domestic product by 2030 and some countries may even lose up to 19% of their GDP.
Fifth: international efforts to confront natural disasters:
In most cases, the countries hit by natural calamities need other nations’ assistance to handle the situation, particularly poor countries hit by disasters bigger than their ability to confront or handle them. Sometimes, even the world’s big powers fail to handle disasters as was the case in the U.S in 2005 when it was hit by the cyclone “Katarina”. In most cases, these countries proclaim a state of emergency, declaring the regions as disaster areas and requesting other nations’ help. As a rule, such assistance comes within the framework bilateral relations or from international agencies. Politics also play a role and in some cases the catastrophe provides an opportunity for resuming contacts as was the case when Iran accepted U.S assistance when it was hit by the 2004 earthquake, or when India accepted Pakistan’s assistant and vice-versa in 2004 and 2005.
Moreover, the U.N, international financing institutions and donors made concerted efforts to help disaster affected nations, providing food supplies, medicines, technical and financial assistance, loans and even rescue teams from the Armed Forces and civil defense agencies. Submitted through multiple channels, it is difficult to give accurate estimates of such assistance.
In the case of Tsunami calamity, assistance to the afflicted nations powered from the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and the Japanese Bank for Development in addition to individual assistance by various countries. Statements show that the World Bank extended $40 billion to finance 550 projects for confronting natural disasters during the period 1980 to 2005.
The World Bank’s efforts in such disasters focused on restoration of livelihood sources and provision of job opportunities. However, international efforts in this respect still had a limited impact due to the following factors:
The international community’s delayed assistance to the afflicted nations. Prompt assistance is more effective than delayed assistance.
In many cases the assistance doesn’t reach its desired destination due to lack of infrastructure, maladministration and inability to handle the disasters.
The assistance falls short of the required relief, rescue and reconstruction operation, hindering the regions efforts to overcome the crises.
The assistance fail to achieve its intended goal due to the inability of the civil society institutions in the affected regions to fully discharge their assignments although they are expected to know the magnitude of the tragedy and its impact on various categories of the population.
In light of the above, the international institutions have focused their attention on learning lessons from these calamities, including:
Focusing the international community’s efforts on restoration of the affected population’s livelihood sources is much better than the mere provision of food, medicine, tents and other in kind assistance.
A case in point is World Bank’s success in helping Indian fishermen to resume their work, supplying them with boats and fishing gear.
Handling the relief and construction operations by the afflicted societies is much better than giving the job to international institutions as this will upgrade the abilities of these societies to handle such disasters and encourage the down-trodden classes to take part in the development process, making foreign assistance really effective.
Reconstruction should be aimed at enhancing the ability of these societies to handle natural disasters in the future even if this entails a minor delay of the reconstruction operation.
International efforts should transcend the mere extension of assistance to handling the challenges of poverty and rehabilitation of the afflicted societies on sound socio-economic basis.
The role of the national Armed Forces will be more effective in confronting the disasters as they possess huge potentials and equipment and are disciplined and not corrupt.
Sixth: Armed Forces role in confronting natural disasters:
A . Armed Forces role based on international experience:
International experience shows that the Armed Forces role includes:
In all disasters:
Taking appropriate measures to protect vital targets such bridges, flyovers, strategic storage of petroleum and important strategic roads.
Extending supplies to the civil defense, including heavy equipment and machines and engineers.
Contributing to the air and land transportation of rescue teams to the afflicted area.
Extending technical assistance and equipment for the operation of public facilities and repairing damaged roads and bridges.
Construction of field hospitals fully furnished with medical staff, equipment and medicines to rescue disaster victims.
In plane accidents:
Working out necessary plans for handling plane accidents in coordination with other relevant bodies as part of the 12th annex of the international civil defense agreement and according to available potentials.
Assisting in the search for missing planes in coordination with relevant bodies.
Extending possible maritime assistance to rescue victims of planes falling into the sea.
In naval disasters:
Command and control to confront naval accidents, coordinating such operations as firefighting, search and rescue and transportation of victims.
Monitoring navigation and barring entry of unauthorized craft.
Assisting in the transportation of other rescue teams and their equipment to the scene of the accident when required.
Informing environmental authorities and water desalination plants in case of a naval accident causing oil leakage or pollution to take the necessary measures.
In floods disasters:
Extending appropriate assistance in case of floods in coastal areas and citizens’ properties are submerged under sea water.
In oil facilities risks:
Extending assistance to confront the threat of oil facilities on the seafront or an oil platform or in a sea island or in harbor facilities.
In dangerous materials threat:
Interference to confront a radiation, chemical or biological accident if it threatens a vital target , ensuring the safe passage of ships carrying dangerous materials until they leave the territorial waters.
Monitoring illegal entry of traffickers in dangerous waste materials.
Handling dangerous materials (chemical, radiation or biological) accidents occurring inside the territorial waters.
Handling a maritime accident involving a radiation or chemical leakage, informing the relevant bodies.
In explosive bodies risks:
Taking the necessary measures to defense and remove explosive bodies and unexploded bombs as and when required.
Handling strange floating explosive bodies.
In war:
Informing the Ministry of Interior of warnings of all possible hostile acts.
Performing technical jobs related to uncovering and measuring pollution percentages, opening purification plants and handling radiation, chemical or biological risks in coordination with the competent technical bodies.
In power outage risks:
Providing electricity and water departments with available requirements such as mobile lighting units, emergency power generators and technicians.
In medical emergencies:
Working out appropriate plans to upgrade the efficiency of hospitals, increasing their capacity to receive victims.
Setting up field hospitals and supplying them with medical staff and equipment.
Offering appropriate air and naval assistance to evacuate victims, if required.
In emergency evacuation:
Contributing to transportation and evacuation efforts and setting up camps to provide shelter for displaced people.
Offering appropriate aid and naval assistance in case of orders to evacuate Sea Islands.
B . Potentials needed to upgrade Armed Forces handling of catastrophes:
The Armed Forces of any country protect its security, ensuring its land, sea and air defense and preserving national accomplishments and stability. The Armed Forces are formed, distributed and trained to achieve the following strategic objectives: protection of the homeland against foreign aggression and preserving its land, territorial waters and air space. They also interfere when the civilian security organs fail to control the internal security situation.
The Armed Forces have various potentials and skills to swiftly control and handle a wide array of circumstances in an organized and disciplined manner. They include the following:
Quick air transportation means that are not available to civil defense organs. Helicopters play a vital role in the first stages of rescue operations in the countries hit by disasters, especially when roads are damaged by floods, earthquakes or volcanoes.
Naval transport means bolster relief efforts. They are more effective than air and land transport, especially in areas close to water ways or in the sinking of motor launches.
Make-shift military hospitals and trained medical staff which the Armed Forces could swiftly deploy in the stricken areas to help local authorities and civil defense organs.
Skills and potentials available to the corps of engineering: trained teams could reactivate road, telephone, water and electricity networks and repair bridges in a record short time. They could also creatively contribute to search and rescue operations, alleviating the impact of the tragedy.
Mobile water purification units could quickly repair water systems damaged by the disaster, providing pure water for survivors. They could also find alternative secure water sources.
Remote sensors and monitoring systems available to the Armed Forces could, to certain extend, predict disasters, or their possible recurrence.
Due to the numerous and massive calamities afflicting some countries and the difficulty in controlling them by governments, national organs and civil defense organs alone, there is a great need for concerted efforts by all civilian and military bodies.
Therefore, in the event of natural or human-made calamities, the local authorities, the Ministry of Interior or any other national agency should take the initiative and officially request the Armed Forces’ technical and relief support, particularly when they determine that the magnitude of the catastrophe is bigger than their capabilities. Also, the Armed Forces should have ready plans to handle calamities at all stages. Judging by states’ experience, the Armed Forces’ assignments include:
Staging land, sea or airlift to dispatch urgent relief, providing enough helicopters, quick transport means and ambulances.
Rescue and relief operations, quickly reaching isolated, infected or threatened regions.
Providing alternative shelter, setting up tents and blankets to accommodate displaced persons and refugees.
Undertaking emergency and treatment operations by setting up field hospitals at or near the scene of the incident.
Cooperation and coordination operations with relevant bodies, including the civil defense, the ministry of health and supply agencies participating in the efforts to control the disaster and its consequences.
Providing accurate information about the catastrophe and the magnitude of losses to contribute to taking the right decisions to address the situation.
Undertaking the supply operations, procuring food and medicine to the victims and all relief teams.
Providing fresh water by repairing networks destroyed by the disaster and providing alternative permanent systems for distribution and storage of well and spring water.
Preservation of security and protection of citizens against theft, robbery and anarchy during the catastrophe.
Guiding relief committees and victims to safe locations.
Performing awareness and education roles to avoid epidemics and risks, using various media forms.
Preparing necessary maps and plans to enable proper understanding of the stricken area with a view to reaching sound decisions to serve the inhabitants.
Participating in reconstruction work to restore the undermined infrastructure.
C . conditions for Armed Forces success in confronting disaster:
For the Armed Forces to achieve their role of alleviating the impact of disaster there should be close cooperation among the Armed Forces’ air, land and naval branches to perform this national duty. There should also be direct follow-up by the Armed Forces commanders. Moreover, the following elements should be available:
Special highly trained forces to perform relief, rescue and supply operations under difficult and extraordinary circumstances.
Continuous training of various Armed Forces sectors to work under various types of disasters such as earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, chemical pollution as well as radiation, nuclear and biological leakage.
Benefitting from the experience of other nations’ armed forces in confronting disaster.
Availability of necessary information to upgrade the ability of armed forces commanders to take prompt decisions to confront calamities.
Wide-scale deployment of armed forces formations and units in various military regions to achieve preparedness for emergencies and calamities.
Availability of operations rooms equipped with state-of-the art technological means to be able to receive quick records, send messages, mobilize forces and follow up developments at the stricken regions.
Coordination during calamities between armed forces commanders at the technical and strategic levels on the one hand and governors, heads of municipalities and civil society organization on the other.
Armed Forces personnel and commanders should be acquainted with geology, geography and topography of the state’s various regions as well as the density of population in such regions.
Cooperation between citizens and Armed Forces personnel during calamities to facilitate the provision of accurate data about the disaster’s developments. This is in addition to information about the magnitude of human and material damage and needed assistance to confront the situation.
Availability of make-shift military hospitals furnished with most modern medical equipment and medical staff to serve victims, in addition to creative rescue means.
Availability of a wide range of helicopters to maintain an airlift, bolster air transport in the stricken region and restore the infrastructure.
In a nutshell, natural and man-made disasters are recurrent and unstoppable. However, many mechanisms and bodies may play a prominent role in alleviating their impact and reducing human and material losses. These include the Armed Forces which possess trained personnel and equipment, in addition to prompt deployment, discipline and proven ability to handle extraordinary circumstances.
By Dr. Hanan Rajae’